If you haven’t already ‘been there and done that’, you will. One day your child will sit in front of a plate of delicious, nutritious food and flatly refuse to eat.
You will beg. You will threaten. You will bargain. You will let them know how fortunate they are to have such wonderful food.
Eventually, you’ll probably give in and give them some ice cream simply to make sure they’ve had some food to sustain them overnight. This may sound terrible if you haven't been through it - but it happens.
At times like this, you’re trying to remain calm and measured while wondering why you had children in the first place.
A new book by Adam Mansbach feels your pain. After achieving amazing success (and 41 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list) with his first book, Go The **** to Sleep, Mansbach tackles another common challenge for modern parents - the often mighty struggle to encourage your child to eat.
Entitled You Have to ******* Eat, it is funny as well as innovative. It’s already been narrated into an audiobook for US, UK and Australian audiences by Bryan Cranston (Breaking Bad), Stephen Fry and Dave Hughes respectively.
Twenty years ago, a book like this might not have succeeded, but the mix of social media, parenting blogs, online magazines like Motherpedia and a quest for advice and stories to be authentic mean that a book like this is the type of honest approach to parenting issues that I think parents want.
Universal parental battles like sleep and eating (the two so far covered by Mansbach) can be fraught with agony can tear away at our sense of success and worth when they don't go well. It is good to know we are not alone.
This book reinforces that parenthood can be delightful, but it’s also challenging. If you want to know that you're not alone in this challenge of being a parent, but also want a good laugh - have a read of it.
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